The Trachiniae

Enter Deianira and Nurse.

Deianira

There is an old-world saying current still, “Of no man canst thou judge the destiny To call it good or evil, till he die.” But I, before I pass into the world Of shadows, know my lot is hard and sad. E’en in my childhood’s home, while yet I dwelt At Pleuron with my father, I had dread Of marriage more than any Aetolian maid; For my first wooer was a river god, Acheloiis, who in triple form appeared To sue my father Oeneus for my hand, Now as a bull, now as a sinuous snake With glittering coils, and now in bulk a man With front of ox, while from his shaggy beard Runnels of fountain-water spouted forth. In terror of so strange a wooer, I Was ever praying death might end my woes, Before I came to such a marriage bed. Then to my joy, though long delayed, the son Of Zeus and of Alemena, good at need, Grappled the monster and delivered me. The circumstance and manner of that fight I cannot tell, not knowing; whoso watched it, Indifferent to the issue, might describe. For me⁠—I sat distracted by the dread That beauty in the end might prove my bane. But Zeus who holds the arbitrament of war Ordered it well, if well indeed it be. For since, his chosen bride, I shared the home Of Heracles, my cares have never ceased; Terror on terror follows, dread on dread, And one night’s trouble drives the last night’s out.

Deianira

Doubtless ye must have heard of my distress, And therefore come; but how my heart is racked Ye cannot know⁠—pray God ye ne’er may know it By suffering! Like to us, the tender plant Is reared and nurtured in some garden close; Nor heat, nor rain, nor any breath of air Vexes it, but unrufiled, unperturbed, It buds and blossoms in sequestered bliss; So fare we till the maid is called a wife And finds her married portion in the night⁠— Dread terror for her husband or her child. Only the woman who by trial knows The cares of wedlock knows what I endure. Many have been my sorrows in the past, But now of one, the woefullest of all, I have to tell. When Heracles, my lord, On his last travel was about to start, He left an ancient tablet in the house, Inscribed with characters that ne’er before, However desperate the enterprise, He would interpret; for he aye set forth As one about to do and not to die. This time, as on his death bed, he prescribed Due portion of his substance as my dower, And to his children severally assigned Their heritage of lands; and fixed a date, Saying that when a year and three full moons Had passed since he departed from his home, He needs must die, or, if he then survived, Live ever after an untroubled life; So by the mouth of the two priestly Doves Dodona’s sacred oak had once declared. And now, this very day, the hour has struck For confirmation of the prophecy. Thus from sweet slumber, friends, ye see me start With terror at the thought of widowed days, If he, the noblest of all men, were gone.

Deianira

How say’st thou? Tell me clearly all thy mind. These covert hints I cannot understand.

Messenger

’Twas for this maiden’s sake (I heard the man, And many witnesses were by, declare it) That Heracles laid prostrate in the dust Oechalia’s battlements and Eurytus. Love was his leader, love alone inspired This doughty deed, not his base servitude As bondsman under Lydian Omphalè, Nor ruth for Iphitus hurled headlong down, As Lichas feigned, who shrank to tell of love. So, when he failed to win her sire’s consent To give the maiden for his paramour, Picking some petty cause of quarrel, he Made war upon her land (the land in which Eurytus, as the herald said, was King) And slew the prince her sire and sacked the town. Now, as thou see’st, he comes and sends before him The maiden, with set purpose, to his house, Not as a slave⁠—how could he so intend, Seeing his heart is kindled with love’s fire? So I determined, Queen, to tell thee all I had heard from Lichas; many heard it too Who stood with me in the Trachinian throng, And can convict him. If my words give pain, It grieves me, but, alas, they are too true.

Deianira

Ah me unhappy! in what plight I stand! What bane have I received beneath my roof, Unwitting, for my ruin! Is she then A nameless maid, as he who brought her sware?

Nay, by the god, I pray, who hurls his bolts On Oeta’s wooded heights, hold nothing back; To no ungenerous woman wilt thou speak, But one that knows the inconstancy of men, Who e’en in joys delight not in one kind. The gamester who would pit himself ’gainst Love Is ill advised. Love rules at will the gods, And me⁠—why not then others weak as I? So were I mad indeed either to blame My husband stricken with love’s malady, Or her the partner of his dalliance: That brings to them no shame or wrong to me. I have more sense. But if he taught thee thus To lie, the lesson thou hast learnt is base; Or if thy fraud is self-taught, thou art like To prove most cruel, meaning to be kind. Nay, tell me the whole truth. The name of liar Is to the free-born man a deadly brand. And think not that thy lying will not out, For many heard thy tale and will inform me. Art thou afraid of me? Thy fears are vain. ’Twould vex me much not to be told the truth; To know it hurts not. Hath not Heracles Had loves before (no mortal more than he) And no one of them ever had harsh word Or taunt from me; nor shall this maid, howe’er She dotes, consumed with passion, on my lord. Nay, my heart bled for pity seeing her Whose beauty was her bane; poor innocent, Who brought to wrack and bondage her own land. All that is past and over, let it sail Adown the stream of time.

Enter Deianira.

Deianira

Friends, while our herald guest is in the house Conversing with the captives, ere he leaves, I have stolen forth to speak with you alone; Partly to tell you what my hands have wrought, And to command your sympathy. This maid⁠— No maiden she but mistress now, methinks⁠— I have harboured (as some merchant takes on board An over-freight) to wreck my peace of mind. And now we twain must share a common couch, To one lord wedded. Such the recompense That Heracles, whom I was wont to extol As model of all virtue, makes me now For all my faithful service as a wife. Yet to be wroth with one like him, infect With this love-plague, I cannot bring myself; But then to share his bed and board with her⁠— What wife could bear it? She’s the budding rose, And I o’erblown and withering on the thorn. Men cull the flower and when the bloom has fled Fling it far from them. This then is my fear, That Heracles will leave me the bare name Of consort, while the younger is his wife. But, as I said, ’tis folly to be wroth. I have a better way to ease my pain, A remedy that I will now reveal. Stored in an urn of brass I long have kept A keepsake of the old-world monster; this The shaggy-breasted Nessus gave to me While yet a girl, and from his wounded side I took it as he lay at point of death; Nessus who ferried wayfarers for hire Across the deep Evenus in his arms, Without the help of oar or sail.